Correlating network event anomalies using active and passive external reconnaissance to identify attack information

ABSTRACT

A system and method for correlating network event anomalies to identify attack information, that identifies anomalous events within the network, identifies correlations between anomalies and other network events and resources, generates a behavior graph describing an attack pathway derived from the correlations, and determines an attack point of origin using the behavior graph.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

Priority is claimed in the application data sheet to the followingpatents or patent applications, the entire written description of eachof which is expressly incorporated herein by reference in its entirety:

-   16/777,270-   16/720,383-   15/823,363-   15/725,274-   15/655,113-   15/616,427-   14/925,974-   15/237,625-   15/206,195-   15/186,453-   15/166,158-   15/141,752-   15/091,563-   14/986,536-   14/925,974

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION Field of the Invention

The disclosure relates to the field of computer management, and moreparticularly to the field of cybersecurity and threat analytics.

Discussion of the State of the Art

Understanding the cybersecurity profile of an organization is a complexendeavor, and the larger the organization, the more difficult the taskis. In fact, the complexity of the task increases exponentially with thesize of the organization, not linearly, because each component of theorganization's network connects to multiple other components. Existingcybersecurity rating methods (for example, the Common VulnerabilityScoring Systems, or CVSS) fail to adequately profile and rate thecybersecurity profiles of organizations because they do not incorporatesufficient information.

What is needed is a system and method for monitoring criticalinfrastructure entities within a network, identifying anomalous networkevents, and correlating those anomalous events to identify attack pathsand points of origin.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Accordingly, the inventor has developed a system and method forcorrelating network event anomalies using active and passivereconnaissance to identify attack information, that can identify attackpatterns and points of origin based on observed anomalies and theirrelationships to other observed network events. The system and methodmay further comprise gathering data about the totality of theorganization's infrastructure and operations, particularly including theorganization's network infrastructure, but also including suchinformation as physical locations, data assets, corporate legalstructure, etc., and gathering data about the organization's operations,including such information as business processes and policies, businessprocess dependencies, prior data loss information and security breaches,and behavioral data for both devices and their users. The system andmethod may further comprise generating a cybersecurity profile usingactive and passive internal and external reconnaissance of theorganization to determine cybersecurity vulnerabilities and potentialimpacts to the business in light of the information gathered about theorganization's infrastructure and operations. The system and method mayfurther comprise generating cybersecurity scores and ratings that takeinto account all of the above information, plus the context and purposeof the score or rating to be generated based on the cybersecurityprofile.

According to a preferred embodiment, a system for correlating networkevent anomalies to identify attack information, comprising: acyber-physical graph module comprising a first plurality of programminginstructions stored in a memory of, and operating on a processor of, acomputing device, wherein the first plurality of programminginstructions, when operating on the processor, cause the computingdevice to create a cyber-physical graph of the organization using theinformation, the cyber-physical graph comprising nodes representingentities associated with the organization and edges representingrelationships between entities associated with the organization; areconnaissance engine comprising a second plurality of programminginstructions stored in the memory of, and operating on the processor of,the computing device, wherein the second plurality of programminginstructions, when operating on the processor, cause the computingdevice to: perform a reconnaissance search using the cyber-physicalgraph; and apply some or all of the results of the reconnaissance searchto the cyber-physical graph to create a normal behavior model for aplurality of nodes in the cyber-physical graph; and a directedcomputational graph engine comprising a third plurality of programminginstructions stored in the memory of, and operating on the processor of,the computing device, wherein the third plurality of programminginstructions, when operating on the processor, cause the computingdevice to: receive the cybersecurity profile and the normal behaviormodel; using the cyber-physical graph and the normal behavior model:identify an anomalous event based on analysis of cyber-physical graphand the normal behavior model; analyze the cyber-physical graph and thenormal behavior model to identify correlations between affected nodes,the affected nodes being based on the anomalous event; generate abehavior graph based on the identified correlations; analyze thebehavior graph to produce a dependency tree comprising causativerelationships between events; and traverse the behavior tree backward ina temporal dimension to identify a plurality of starting conditions forthe anomalous event, is disclosed.

According to another preferred embodiment, a method for correlatingnetwork event anomalies to identify attack information, comprising thesteps of: creating a cyber-physical graph of an organization usingentities associated with the organization and relationships between theentities associated with the organization, the cyber-physical graphcomprising nodes representing the entities associated with theorganization and edges representing the relationships between entitiesassociated with the organization; performing a reconnaissance searchusing the cyber-physical graph; applying some or all of the results ofthe reconnaissance search to the cyber-physical graph to create a normalbehavior model for a plurality of nodes in the cyber-physical graph; andusing the cyber-physical graph and the normal behavior model:identifying an anomalous event based on analysis of cyber-physical graphand the normal behavior model; analyzing the cyber-physical graph andthe normal behavior model to identify correlations between affectednodes, the affected nodes being based on the anomalous event; generatinga behavior graph based on the identified correlations; analyzing thebehavior graph to produce a dependency tree comprising causativerelationships between events; and traversing the behavior tree backwardin a temporal dimension to identify a plurality of starting conditionsfor the anomalous event, is disclosed.

According to an aspect of an embodiment, a directed computational graphis used, comprising nodes representing data transformations and edgesrepresenting communications between the nodes; wherein a plurality ofnodes represents a data transformation pipeline; and wherein thedirected computational graph is used to direct a workflow in the system.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING FIGURES

The accompanying drawings illustrate several aspects and, together withthe description, serve to explain the principles of the inventionaccording to the aspects. It will be appreciated by one skilled in theart that the particular arrangements illustrated in the drawings aremerely exemplary, and are not to be considered as limiting of the scopeof the invention or the claims herein in any way.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an exemplary system architecture for anadvanced cyber decision platform for external network reconnaissance andcybersecurity rating.

FIG. 2A is a block diagram showing general steps for performing passivenetwork reconnaissance.

FIG. 2B is a process diagram showing a general flow of a process forperforming active reconnaissance using DNS leak information collection.

FIG. 2C is a process diagram showing a general flow of a process forperforming active reconnaissance using web application and technologyreconnaissance.

FIG. 2D is a process diagram showing a general flow of a process forproducing a cybersecurity rating using reconnaissance data.

FIGS. 3A and 3B are process diagrams showing business operating systemfunctions in use to mitigate cyberattacks.

FIG. 4 is a process flow diagram of a method for segmenting cyberattackinformation to appropriate corporation parties.

FIG. 5 is a diagram of an exemplary architecture for a system for rapidpredictive analysis of very large data sets using an actor-drivendistributed computational graph, according to one aspect.

FIG. 6 is a diagram of an exemplary architecture for a system for rapidpredictive analysis of very large data sets using an actor-drivendistributed computational graph, according to one aspect.

FIG. 7 is a diagram of an exemplary architecture for a system for rapidpredictive analysis of very large data sets using an actor-drivendistributed computational graph, according to one aspect.

FIG. 8 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method for cybersecuritybehavioral analytics, according to one aspect.

FIG. 9 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method for measuring theeffects of cybersecurity attacks, according to one aspect.

FIG. 10 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method for continuouscybersecurity monitoring and exploration, according to one aspect.

FIG. 11 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method for mapping acyber-physical system graph, according to one aspect.

FIG. 12 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method for continuous networkresilience rating, according to one aspect.

FIG. 13 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method for cybersecurityprivilege oversight, according to one aspect.

FIG. 14 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method for cybersecurity riskmanagement, according to one aspect.

FIG. 15 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method for mitigatingcompromised credential threats, according to one aspect.

FIG. 16 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method for dynamic network androgue device discovery, according to one aspect.

FIG. 17 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method for Kerberos “goldenticket” attack detection, according to one aspect.

FIG. 18 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method for risk-basedvulnerability and patch management, according to one aspect.

FIG. 19 is block diagram showing an exemplary system architecture for asystem for cybersecurity profiling and rating.

FIG. 20 is a relational diagram showing the relationships betweenexemplary 3^(rd) party search tools, search tasks that can be generatedusing such tools, and the types of information that may be gathered withthose tasks.

FIG. 21 is a relational diagram showing the exemplary types andclassifications of information that may be used in constructing acyber-physical graph of an organization's infrastructure and operations.

FIG. 22 is a directed graph diagram showing an exemplary cyber-physicalgraph and its possible use in analyzing cybersecurity threats.

FIG. 23 is a block diagram showing exemplary operation of a data to rulemapper.

FIG. 24 is block diagram showing an exemplary architecture diagram for ascoring engine.

FIG. 25 is a block diagram illustrating an exemplary hardwarearchitecture of a computing device.

FIG. 26 is a block diagram illustrating an exemplary logicalarchitecture for a client device.

FIG. 27 is a block diagram illustrating an exemplary architecturalarrangement of clients, servers, and external services.

FIG. 28 is another block diagram illustrating an exemplary hardwarearchitecture of a computing device.

FIG. 29 is a flow diagram illustrating an exemplary method foridentifying an anomalous network event.

FIG. 30 is a flow diagram illustrating an exemplary method foridentifying correlations between an anomaly and other network events andresources.

FIG. 31 is a flow diagram illustrating an exemplary method forgenerating a behavior graph based on an identified anomaly and itscorrelations.

FIG. 32 is a flow diagram illustrating an exemplary method fordetermining an attack's point of origin using a behavior graph.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The inventor has conceived, and reduced to practice, a system and methodfor correlating network event anomalies using active and passivereconnaissance to identify attack information, that can identify attackpatterns and points of origin based on observed anomalies and theirrelationships to other observed network events. The system and methodmay further comprise gathering data about the totality of theorganization's infrastructure and operations, particularly including theorganization's network infrastructure, but also including suchinformation as physical locations, data assets, corporate legalstructure, etc., and gathering data about the organization's operations,including such information as business processes and policies, businessprocess dependencies, prior data loss information and security breaches,and behavioral data for both devices and their users. The system andmethod may further comprise generating a cybersecurity profile usingactive and passive internal and external reconnaissance of theorganization to determine cybersecurity vulnerabilities and potentialimpacts to the business in light of the information gathered about theorganization's infrastructure and operations. The system and method mayfurther comprise generating cybersecurity scores and ratings that takeinto account all of the above information, plus the context and purposeof the score or rating to be generated based on the cybersecurityprofile.

One or more different aspects may be described in the presentapplication. Further, for one or more of the aspects described herein,numerous alternative arrangements may be described; it should beappreciated that these are presented for illustrative purposes only andare not limiting of the aspects contained herein or the claims presentedherein in any way. One or more of the arrangements may be widelyapplicable to numerous aspects, as may be readily apparent from thedisclosure. In general, arrangements are described in sufficient detailto enable those skilled in the art to practice one or more of theaspects, and it should be appreciated that other arrangements may beutilized and that structural, logical, software, electrical and otherchanges may be made without departing from the scope of the particularaspects. Particular features of one or more of the aspects describedherein may be described with reference to one or more particular aspectsor figures that form a part of the present disclosure, and in which areshown, by way of illustration, specific arrangements of one or more ofthe aspects. It should be appreciated, however, that such features arenot limited to usage in the one or more particular aspects or figureswith reference to which they are described. The present disclosure isneither a literal description of all arrangements of one or more of theaspects nor a listing of features of one or more of the aspects thatmust be present in all arrangements.

Headings of sections provided in this patent application and the titleof this patent application are for convenience only, and are not to betaken as limiting the disclosure in any way.

Devices that are in communication with each other need not be incontinuous communication with each other, unless expressly specifiedotherwise. In addition, devices that are in communication with eachother may communicate directly or indirectly through one or morecommunication means or intermediaries, logical or physical.

A description of an aspect with several components in communication witheach other does not imply that all such components are required. To thecontrary, a variety of optional components may be described toillustrate a wide variety of possible aspects and in order to more fullyillustrate one or more aspects. Similarly, although process steps,method steps, algorithms or the like may be described in a sequentialorder, such processes, methods and algorithms may generally beconfigured to work in alternate orders, unless specifically stated tothe contrary. In other words, any sequence or order of steps that may bedescribed in this patent application does not, in and of itself,indicate a requirement that the steps be performed in that order. Thesteps of described processes may be performed in any order practical.Further, some steps may be performed simultaneously despite beingdescribed or implied as occurring non-simultaneously (e.g., because onestep is described after the other step). Moreover, the illustration of aprocess by its depiction in a drawing does not imply that theillustrated process is exclusive of other variations and modificationsthereto, does not imply that the illustrated process or any of its stepsare necessary to one or more of the aspects, and does not imply that theillustrated process is preferred. Also, steps are generally describedonce per aspect, but this does not mean they must occur once, or thatthey may only occur once each time a process, method, or algorithm iscarried out or executed. Some steps may be omitted in some aspects orsome occurrences, or some steps may be executed more than once in agiven aspect or occurrence.

When a single device or article is described herein, it will be readilyapparent that more than one device or article may be used in place of asingle device or article. Similarly, where more than one device orarticle is described herein, it will be readily apparent that a singledevice or article may be used in place of the more than one device orarticle.

The functionality or the features of a device may be alternativelyembodied by one or more other devices that are not explicitly describedas having such functionality or features. Thus, other aspects need notinclude the device itself.

Techniques and mechanisms described or referenced herein will sometimesbe described in singular form for clarity. However, it should beappreciated that particular aspects may include multiple iterations of atechnique or multiple instantiations of a mechanism unless notedotherwise. Process descriptions or blocks in figures should beunderstood as representing modules, segments, or portions of code whichinclude one or more executable instructions for implementing specificlogical functions or steps in the process. Alternate implementations areincluded within the scope of various aspects in which, for example,functions may be executed out of order from that shown or discussed,including substantially concurrently or in reverse order, depending onthe functionality involved, as would be understood by those havingordinary skill in the art.

Definitions

As used herein, “graph” is a representation of information andrelationships, where each primary unit of information makes up a “node”or “vertex” of the graph and the relationship between two nodes makes upan edge of the graph. Nodes can be further qualified by the connectionof one or more descriptors or “properties” to that node. For example,given the node “James R,” name information for a person, qualifyingproperties might be “183 cm tall”, “DOB Aug. 13, 1965” and “speaksEnglish”. Similar to the use of properties to further describe theinformation in a node, a relationship between two nodes that forms anedge can be qualified using a “label”.

Thus, given a second node “Thomas G,” an edge between “James R” and“Thomas G” that indicates that the two people know each other might belabeled “knows.” When graph theory notation (Graph=(Vertices, Edges)) isapplied this situation, the set of nodes are used as one parameter ofthe ordered pair, V and the set of 2 element edge endpoints are used asthe second parameter of the ordered pair, E. When the order of the edgeendpoints within the pairs of E is not significant, for example, theedge James R, Thomas G is equivalent to Thomas G, James R, the graph isdesignated as “undirected.” Under circumstances when a relationshipflows from one node to another in one direction, for example James R is“taller” than Thomas G, the order of the endpoints is significant.Graphs with such edges are designated as “directed.” In the distributedcomputational graph system, transformations within transformationpipeline are represented as directed graph with each transformationcomprising a node and the output messages between transformationscomprising edges. Distributed computational graph stipulates thepotential use of non-linear transformation pipelines which areprogrammatically linearized. Such linearization can result inexponential growth of resource consumption. The most sensible approachto overcome possibility is to introduce new transformation pipelinesjust as they are needed, creating only those that are ready to compute.Such method results in transformation graphs which are highly variablein size and node, edge composition as the system processes data streams.Those familiar with the art will realize that transformation graph mayassume many shapes and sizes with a vast topography of edgerelationships. The examples given were chosen for illustrative purposesonly and represent a small number of the simplest of possibilities.These examples should not be taken to define the possible graphsexpected as part of operation of the invention

As used herein, “transformation” is a function performed on zero or morestreams of input data which results in a single stream of output whichmay or may not then be used as input for another transformation.Transformations may comprise any combination of machine, human ormachine-human interactions Transformations need not change data thatenters them, one example of this type of transformation would be astorage transformation which would receive input and then act as a queuefor that data for subsequent transformations. As implied above, aspecific transformation may generate output data in the absence of inputdata. A time stamp serves as a example. In the invention,transformations are placed into pipelines such that the output of onetransformation may serve as an input for another. These pipelines canconsist of two or more transformations with the number oftransformations limited only by the resources of the system.Historically, transformation pipelines have been linear with eachtransformation in the pipeline receiving input from one antecedent andproviding output to one subsequent with no branching or iteration. Otherpipeline configurations are possible. The invention is designed topermit several of these configurations including, but not limited to:linear, afferent branch, efferent branch and cyclical.

A “database” or “data storage subsystem” (these terms may be consideredsubstantially synonymous), as used herein, is a system adapted for thelong-term storage, indexing, and retrieval of data, the retrievaltypically being via some sort of querying interface or language.“Database” may be used to refer to relational database managementsystems known in the art, but should not be considered to be limited tosuch systems. Many alternative database or data storage systemtechnologies have been, and indeed are being, introduced in the art,including but not limited to distributed non-relational data storagesystems such as Hadoop, column-oriented databases, in-memory databases,and the like. While various aspects may preferentially employ one oranother of the various data storage subsystems available in the art (oravailable in the future), the invention should not be construed to be solimited, as any data storage architecture may be used according to theaspects. Similarly, while in some cases one or more particular datastorage needs are described as being satisfied by separate components(for example, an expanded private capital markets database and aconfiguration database), these descriptions refer to functional uses ofdata storage systems and do not refer to their physical architecture.For instance, any group of data storage systems of databases referred toherein may be included together in a single database management systemoperating on a single machine, or they may be included in a singledatabase management system operating on a cluster of machines as isknown in the art. Similarly, any single database (such as an expandedprivate capital markets database) may be implemented on a singlemachine, on a set of machines using clustering technology, on severalmachines connected by one or more messaging systems known in the art, orin a master/slave arrangement common in the art. These examples shouldmake clear that no particular architectural approaches to databasemanagement is preferred according to the invention, and choice of datastorage technology is at the discretion of each implementer, withoutdeparting from the scope of the invention as claimed.

A “data context”, as used herein, refers to a set of argumentsidentifying the location of data. This could be a Rabbit queue, a .csvfile in cloud-based storage, or any other such location reference excepta single event or record. Activities may pass either events or datacontexts to each other for processing. The nature of a pipeline allowsfor direct information passing between activities, and data locations orfiles do not need to be predetermined at pipeline start.

A “pipeline”, as used herein and interchangeably referred to as a “datapipeline” or a “processing pipeline”, refers to a set of data streamingactivities and batch activities. Streaming and batch activities can beconnected indiscriminately within a pipeline. Events will flow throughthe streaming activity actors in a reactive way. At the junction of astreaming activity to batch activity, there will exist aStreamBatchProtocol data object. This object is responsible fordetermining when and if the batch process is run. One or more of threepossibilities can be used for processing triggers: regular timinginterval, every N events, or optionally an external trigger. The eventsare held in a queue or similar until processing. Each batch activity maycontain a “source” data context (this may be a streaming context if theupstream activities are streaming), and a “destination” data context(which is passed to the next activity). Streaming activities may have anoptional “destination” streaming data context (optional meaning:caching/persistence of events vs. ephemeral), though this should not bepart of the initial implementation.

Conceptual Architecture

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an advanced cyber decision platform forexternal network reconnaissance and cybersecurity rating. Client accessto the system 105 for specific data entry, system control and forinteraction with system output such as automated predictive decisionmaking and planning and alternate pathway simulations, occurs throughthe system's distributed, extensible high bandwidth cloud interface 110which uses a versatile, robust web application driven interface for bothinput and display of client-facing information via network 107 andoperates a data store 112 such as, but not limited to MONGODB™,COUCHDB™, CASSANDRA™ or REDIS™ according to various arrangements. Muchof the business data analyzed by the system both from sources within theconfines of the client business, and from cloud based sources, alsoenter the system through the cloud interface 110, data being passed tothe connector module 135 which may possess the API routines 135 a neededto accept and convert the external data and then pass the normalizedinformation to other analysis and transformation components of thesystem, the directed computational graph module 155, high volume webcrawler module 115, multidimensional time series database (MDTSDB) 120and the graph stack service 145. The directed computational graph module155 retrieves one or more streams of data from a plurality of sources,which includes, but is in no way not limited to, a plurality of physicalsensors, network service providers, web based questionnaires andsurveys, monitoring of electronic infrastructure, crowd sourcingcampaigns, and human input device information. Within the directedcomputational graph module 155, data may be split into two identicalstreams in a specialized pre-programmed data pipeline 155 a, wherein onesub-stream may be sent for batch processing and storage while the othersub-stream may be reformatted for transformation pipeline analysis. Thedata is then transferred to the general transformer service module 160for linear data transformation as part of analysis or the decomposabletransformer service module 150 for branching or iterativetransformations that are part of analysis. The directed computationalgraph module 155 represents all data as directed graphs where thetransformations are nodes and the result messages betweentransformations edges of the graph. The high volume web crawling module115 uses multiple server hosted preprogrammed web spiders, which whileautonomously configured are deployed within a web scraping framework 115a of which SCRAPY™ is an example, to identify and retrieve data ofinterest from web based sources that are not well tagged by conventionalweb crawling technology. The multiple dimension time series data storemodule 120 may receive streaming data from a large plurality of sensorsthat may be of several different types. The multiple dimension timeseries data store module may also store any time series data encounteredby the system such as but not limited to enterprise network usage data,component and system logs, performance data, network service informationcaptures such as, but not limited to news and financial feeds, and salesand service related customer data. The module is designed to accommodateirregular and high volume surges by dynamically allotting networkbandwidth and server processing channels to process the incoming data.Inclusion of programming wrappers 120 a for languages examples of whichare, but not limited to C++, PERL, PYTHON, and ERLANG™ allowssophisticated programming logic to be added to the default function ofthe multidimensional time series database 120 without intimate knowledgeof the core programming, greatly extending breadth of function. Dataretrieved by the multidimensional time series database (MDTSDB) 120 andthe high volume web crawling module 115 may be further analyzed andtransformed into task optimized results by the directed computationalgraph 155 and associated general transformer service 150 anddecomposable transformer service 160 modules. Alternately, data from themultidimensional time series database and high volume web crawlingmodules may be sent, often with scripted cuing information determiningimportant vertexes 145 a, to the graph stack service module 145 which,employing standardized protocols for converting streams of informationinto graph representations of that data, for example, open graphinternet technology although the invention is not reliant on any onestandard. Through the steps, the graph stack service module 145represents data in graphical form influenced by any pre-determinedscripted modifications 145 a and stores it in a graph-based data store145 b such as GIRAPH™ or a key value pair type data store REDIS™, orRIAK™, among others, all of which are suitable for storing graph-basedinformation.

Results of the transformative analysis process may then be combined withfurther client directives, additional business rules and practicesrelevant to the analysis and situational information external to thealready available data in the automated planning service module 130which also runs powerful information theory 130 a based predictivestatistics functions and machine learning algorithms to allow futuretrends and outcomes to be rapidly forecast based upon the current systemderived results and choosing each a plurality of possible businessdecisions. The using all available data, the automated planning servicemodule 130 may propose business decisions most likely to result is themost favorable business outcome with a usably high level of certainty.Closely related to the automated planning service module in the use ofsystem derived results in conjunction with possible externally suppliedadditional information in the assistance of end user business decisionmaking, the action outcome simulation module 125 with its discrete eventsimulator programming module 125 a coupled with the end user facingobservation and state estimation service 140 which is highly scriptable140 b as circumstances require and has a game engine 140 a to morerealistically stage possible outcomes of business decisions underconsideration, allows business decision makers to investigate theprobable outcomes of choosing one pending course of action over anotherbased upon analysis of the current available data.

When performing external reconnaissance via a network 107, web crawler115 may be used to perform a variety of port and service scanningoperations on a plurality of hosts. This may be used to targetindividual network hosts (for example, to examine a specific server orclient device) or to broadly scan any number of hosts (such as all hostswithin a particular domain, or any number of hosts up to the completeIPv4 address space). Port scanning is primarily used for gatheringinformation about hosts and services connected to a network, using probemessages sent to hosts that prompt a response from that host. Portscanning is generally centered around the transmission control protocol(TCP), and using the information provided in a prompted response a portscan can provide information about network and application layers on thetargeted host.

Port scan results can yield information on open, closed, or undeterminedports on a target host. An open port indicated that an application orservice is accepting connections on this port (such as ports used forreceiving customer web traffic on a web server), and these portsgenerally disclose the greatest quantity of useful information about thehost. A closed port indicates that no application or service islistening for connections on that port, and still provides informationabout the host such as revealing the operating system of the host, whichmay discovered by fingerprinting the TCP/IP stack in a response.Different operating systems exhibit identifiable behaviors whenpopulating TCP fields, and collecting multiple responses and matchingthe fields against a database of known fingerprints makes it possible todetermine the OS of the host even when no ports are open. Anundetermined port is one that does not produce a requested response,generally because the port is being filtered by a firewall on the hostor between the host and the network (for example, a corporate firewallbehind which all internal servers operate).

Scanning may be defined by scope to limit the scan according to twodimensions, hosts and ports. A horizontal scan checks the same port onmultiple hosts, often used by attackers to check for an open port on anyavailable hosts to select a target for an attack that exploits avulnerability using that port. This type of scan is also useful forsecurity audits, to ensure that vulnerabilities are not exposed on anyof the target hosts. A vertical scan defines multiple ports to examineon a single host, for example a “vanilla scan” which targets every portof a single host, or a “strobe scan” that targets a small subset ofports on the host. This type of scan is usually performed forvulnerability detection on single systems, and due to the single-hostnature is impractical for large network scans. A block scan combineselements of both horizontal and vertical scanning, to scan multipleports on multiple hosts. This type of scan is useful for a variety ofservice discovery and data collection tasks, as it allows a broad scanof many hosts (up to the entire Internet, using the complete IPv4address space) for a number of desired ports in a single sweep.

Large port scans involve quantitative research, and as such may betreated as experimental scientific measurement and are subject tomeasurement and quality standards to ensure the usefulness of results.To avoid observational errors during measurement, results must beprecise (describing a degree of relative proximity between individualmeasured values), accurate (describing relative proximity of measuredvalues to a reference value), preserve any metadata that accompanies themeasured data, avoid misinterpretation of data due to faulty measurementexecution, and must be well-calibrated to efficiently expose and addressissues of inaccuracy or misinterpretation. In addition to these basicrequirements, large volumes of data may lead to unexpected behavior ofanalysis tools, and extracting a subset to perform initial analysis mayhelp to provide an initial overview before working with the completedata set. Analysis should also be reproducible, as with all experimentalscience, and should incorporate publicly-available data to add value tothe comprehensibility of the research as well as contributing to a“common framework” that may be used to confirm results.

When performing a port scan, web crawler 115 may employ a variety ofsoftware suitable for the task, such as Nmap, ZMap, or masscan. Nmap issuitable for large scans as well as scanning individual hosts, andexcels in offering a variety of diverse scanning techniques. ZMap is anewer application and unlike Nmap (which is more general-purpose), ZMapis designed specifically with Internet-wide scans as the intent. As aresult, ZMap is far less customizable and relies on horizontal portscans for functionality, achieving fast scan times using techniques ofprobe randomization (randomizing the order in which probes are sent tohosts, minimizing network saturation) and asynchronous design (utilizingstateless operation to send and receive packets in separate processingthreads). Masscan uses the same asynchronous operation model of ZMap, aswell as probe randomization. In masscan however, a certain degree ofstatistical randomness is sacrificed to improve computation time forlarge scans (such as when scanning the entire IPv4 address space), usingthe BlackRock algorithm. This is a modified implementation of symmetricencryption algorithm DES, with fewer rounds and modulo operations inplace of binary ones to allow for arbitrary ranges and achieve fastercomputation time for large data sets.

Received scan responses may be collected and processed through aplurality of data pipelines 155 a to analyze the collected information.MDTSDB 120 and graph stack 145 may be used to produce a hybridgraph/time-series database using the analyzed data, forming a graph ofInternet-accessible organization resources and their evolving stateinformation over time. Customer-specific profiling and scanninginformation may be linked to CPG graphs (as described below in detail,referring to FIG. 11) for a particular customer, but this informationmay be further linked to the base-level graph of internet-accessibleresources and information. Depending on customer authorizations andlegal or regulatory restrictions and authorizations, techniques used mayinvolve both passive, semi-passive and active scanning andreconnaissance.

FIG. 2A is a block diagram showing general steps 200 for performingpassive network reconnaissance. It should be appreciated that the stepsillustrated and described may be performed in any order, and that stepsmay be added or omitted as needed for any particular reconnaissanceoperation. In a step 201, network address ranges and domains orsub-domains associated with a plurality of targets may be identified,for example to collect information for defining the scope of furtherscanning operations. In another step 202, external sites may beidentified to understand relationships between targets and otherthird-party content providers, such as trust relationships orauthoritative domain name service (DNS) resolution records. In anotherstep 203, individual people or groups may be identified using names,email addresses, phone numbers, or other identifying information thatmay be useful for a variety of social engineering activities. In anotherstep 204, technologies used may be identified, such as types or versionsof hardware or software used by an organization, and this may includecollecting and extracting information from job descriptions (forexample) to identify technologies in use by an organization (forexample, a job description for an administrator familiar with specificdatabase software indicates that said software is in use within theorganization). In another step 205, content of interest may beidentified, for example including web and email portals, log files,backup or archive files, and other forms of sensitive information thatmay be contained within HTML comments or client-side scripts, as may beuseful for vulnerability discovery and penetration testing activities.In another step 206, publicly-available information may be used toidentify vulnerabilities that may be exploited with further activepenetration testing.

FIG. 2B is a process diagram showing a general flow of a process 210 forperforming active reconnaissance using DNS leak information collection.In an initial step 211, publicly-available DNS leak disclosureinformation may be collected to maintain current information regardingknown leaks and vulnerabilities. In a next step 212, third-level domain(TLDR) information may be collected and used to report domain riskfactors, such as domains that do not resolve properly (due to malformedDNS records, for example). In a next step 213, a DNS trust map may becreated using a hybrid graph/time-series data structure, using a graphstack service 145 and MDTSDB 120. This trust map may be produced as theoutput of an extraction process performed by a DCG 155 through aplurality of data pipelines 155 a, analyzing collected data and mappingdata points to produce hybrid structured output representing each datapoint over time. In a final step 214, the trust map may then be analyzedto identify anomalies, for example using community detection algorithmsthat may discover when new references are being created, and this may beused to identify vulnerabilities that may arise as a byproduct of thereferential nature of a DNS hierarchy. In this manner, DCG pipelineprocessing and time-series data graphing may be used to identifyvulnerabilities that would otherwise be obscured within a large dataset.

FIG. 2C is a process diagram showing a general flow of a process 220 forperforming active reconnaissance using web application and technologyreconnaissance. In an initial step 221, a plurality of manual HTTPrequests may be transmitted to a host, for example to determine if a webserver is announcing itself, or to obtain an application version numberfrom an HTTP response message. In a next step 222, a robots.txt, used toidentify and communicate with web crawlers and other automated “bots”,may be searched for to identify portions of an application or site thatrobots are requested to ignore. In a next step 223, the host applicationlayer may be fingerprinted, for example using file extensions andresponse message fields to identify characteristic patterns or markersthat may be used to identify host or application details. In a next step224, publicly-exposed/admin pages may be checked, to determine if anyadministrative portals are exposed and therefore potentially-vulnerable,as well as to potentially determine administration policies orcapabilities based on exposed information. In a final step 225, anapplication may be profiled according to a particular toolset in use,such as WORDPRESS™ (for example) or other specific tools or plugins.

FIG. 2D is a process diagram showing a general flow of a process 230 forproducing a cybersecurity rating using reconnaissance data. In aninitial step 231, external reconnaissance may be performed using DNS andIP information as described above (referring to FIG. 2B), collectinginformation from DNS records, leak announcements, and publicly-availablerecords to produce a DNS trust map from collected information and theDCG-driven analysis thereof. In a next step 232, web and applicationrecon may be performed (as described in FIG. 2C), collecting informationon applications, sites, and publicly-available records. In a next step233, collected information over time may be analyzed for softwareversion numbers, revealing the patching frequency of target hosts andtheir respective applications and services. Using a hybrid time-seriesgraph, timestamps may be associated with ongoing changes to reveal theseupdates over time. In a next step 234, a plurality of additionalendpoints may be scanned, such as (for example, including but notlimited to) internet-of-things (IoT) devices that may be scanned andfingerprinted, end-user devices such as personal smartphones, tablets,or computers, or social network endpoints such as scraping content fromuser social media pages or feeds. User devices may be fingerprinted andanalyzed similar to organization hosts, and social media content may beretrieved such as collecting sentiment from services like TWITTER™ orLINKEDIN™, or analyzing job description listings and otherpublicly-available information. In a next step 235, open-sourceintelligence feeds may be checked, such as company IP addressblacklists, search domains, or information leaks (for example, posted topublic records such as PASTEBIN™). In a final step 236, collectedinformation from all sources may be scored according to a weightedsystem, producing an overall cybersecurity rating score based on theinformation collected and the analysis of that information to revealadditional insights, relationships, and vulnerabilities.

For example, in an exemplary scoring system similar to a credit rating,information from initial Internet recon operations may be assigned ascore up to 400 points, along with up to 200 additional points forweb/application recon results, 100 points for patch frequency, and 50points each for additional endpoints and open-source intel results. Thisyields a weighted score incorporating all available information from allscanned sources, allowing a meaningful and readily-appreciablerepresentation of an organization's overall cybersecurity strength.Additionally, as scanning may be performed repeatedly and resultscollected into a time-series hybrid data structure, this cybersecurityrating may evolve over time to continuously reflect the current state ofthe organization, reflecting any recent changes, newly-discovered orannounced vulnerabilities, software or hardware updates, newly-added orremoved devices or services, and any other changes that may occur.

FIGS. 3A and 3B are process diagrams showing business operating systemfunctions in use to mitigate cyberattacks. Input network data which mayinclude network flow patterns 321, the origin and destination of eachpiece of measurable network traffic 322, system logs from servers andworkstations on the network 323, endpoint data 329, any security eventlog data from servers or available security information and event (SIEM)systems 324, external threat intelligence feeds 324, identity orassessment context 325, external network health or cybersecurity feeds326, Kerberos domain controller or ACTIVE DIRECTORY™ server logs orinstrumentation 327, business unit performance related data 328,endpoint data 329, among many other possible data types for which theinvention was designed to analyze and integrate, may pass into 315 thebusiness operating system 310 for analysis as part of its cyber securityfunction. These multiple types of data from a plurality of sources maybe transformed for analysis 311, 312 using at least one of thespecialized cybersecurity, risk assessment or common functions of thebusiness operating system in the role of cybersecurity system, such as,but not limited to network and system user privilege oversight 331,network and system user behavior analytics 332, attacker and defenderaction timeline 333, SIEM integration and analysis 334, dynamicbenchmarking 335, and incident identification and resolution performanceanalytics 336 among other possible cybersecurity functions; value atrisk (VAR) modeling and simulation 341, anticipatory vs. reactive costestimations of different types of data breaches to establish priorities342, work factor analysis 343 and cyber event discovery rate 344 as partof the system's risk analytics capabilities; and the ability to formatand deliver customized reports and dashboards 351, perform generalized,ad hoc data analytics on demand 352, continuously monitor, process andexplore incoming data for subtle changes or diffuse informationalthreads 353 and generate cyber-physical systems graphing 354 as part ofthe business operating system's common capabilities. Output 317 can beused to configure network gateway security appliances 361, to assist inpreventing network intrusion through predictive change to infrastructurerecommendations 362, to alert an enterprise of ongoing cyberattack earlyin the attack cycle, possibly thwarting it but at least mitigating thedamage 362, to record compliance to standardized guidelines or SLArequirements 363, to continuously probe existing network infrastructureand issue alerts to any changes which may make a breach more likely 364,suggest solutions to any domain controller ticketing weaknesses detected365, detect presence of malware 366, perform one time or continuousvulnerability scanning depending on client directives 367, and thwart ormitigate damage from cyber attacks 368. These examples are, of course,only a subset of the possible uses of the system, they are exemplary innature and do not reflect any boundaries in the capabilities of theinvention.

FIG. 4 is a process flow diagram of a method for segmenting cyberattackinformation to appropriate corporation parties 400. As previouslydisclosed 200, 351, one of the strengths of the advanced cyber-decisionplatform is the ability to finely customize reports and dashboards tospecific audiences, concurrently is appropriate. This customization ispossible due to the devotion of a portion of the business operatingsystem's programming specifically to outcome presentation by moduleswhich include the observation and state estimation service 140 with itsgame engine 140 a and script interpreter 140 b. In the setting ofcybersecurity, issuance of specialized alerts, updates and reports maysignificantly assist in getting the correct mitigating actions done inthe most timely fashion while keeping all participants informed atpredesignated, appropriate granularity. Upon the detection of acyberattack by the system 401 all available information about theongoing attack and existing cybersecurity knowledge are analyzed,including through predictive simulation in near real time 402 to developboth the most accurate appraisal of current events and actionablerecommendations concerning where the attack may progress and how it maybe mitigated. The information generated in totality is often more thanany one group needs to perform their mitigation tasks. At this point,during a cyberattack, providing a single expansive and all inclusivealert, dashboard image, or report may make identification and actionupon the crucial information by each participant more difficult,therefore the cybersecurity focused arrangement may create multipletargeted information streams each concurrently designed to produce mostrapid and efficacious action throughout the enterprise during the attackand issue follow-up reports with and recommendations or information thatmay lead to long term changes afterward 403. Examples of groups that mayreceive specialized information streams include but may not be limitedto front line responders during the attack 404, incident forensicssupport both during and after the attack 405, chief information securityofficer 406 and chief risk officer 407 the information sent to thelatter two focused to appraise overall damage and to implement bothmitigating strategy and preventive changes after the attack. Front lineresponders may use the cyber-decision platform's analyzed, transformedand correlated information specifically sent to them 404 to probe theextent of the attack, isolate such things as: the predictive attacker'sentry point onto the enterprise's network, the systems involved or thepredictive ultimate targets of the attack and may use the simulationcapabilities of the system to investigate alternate methods ofsuccessfully ending the attack and repelling the attackers in the mostefficient manner, although many other queries known to those skilled inthe art are also answerable by the invention. Simulations run may alsoinclude the predictive effects of any attack mitigating actions onnormal and critical operation of the enterprise's IT systems andcorporate users. Similarly, a chief information security officer may usethe cyber-decision platform to predictively analyze 406 what corporateinformation has already been compromised, predictively simulate theultimate information targets of the attack that may or may not have beencompromised and the total impact of the attack what can be done now andin the near future to safeguard that information. Further, duringretrospective forensic inspection of the attack, the forensic respondermay use the cyber-decision platform 405 a to clearly and completely mapthe extent of network infrastructure through predictive simulation andlarge volume data analysis. The forensic analyst may also use theplatform's capabilities to perform a time series and infrastructuralspatial analysis of the attack's progression with methods used toinfiltrate the enterprise's subnets and servers. Again, the chief riskofficer would perform analyses of what information 407 a was stolen andpredictive simulations on what the theft means to the enterprise as timeprogresses. Additionally, the system's predictive capabilities may beemployed to assist in creation of a plan for changes of the ITinfrastructural that should be made that are optimal for remediation ofcybersecurity risk under possibly limited enterprise budgetaryconstraints in place at the company so as to maximize financial outcome.

FIG. 5 is a diagram of an exemplary architecture for a system for rapidpredictive analysis of very large data sets using an actor-drivendistributed computational graph 500, according to one aspect. Accordingto the aspect, a DCG 500 may comprise a pipeline orchestrator 501 thatmay be used to perform a variety of data transformation functions ondata within a processing pipeline, and may be used with a messagingsystem 510 that enables communication with any number of variousservices and protocols, relaying messages and translating them as neededinto protocol-specific API system calls for interoperability withexternal systems (rather than requiring a particular protocol or serviceto be integrated into a DCG 500).

Pipeline orchestrator 501 may spawn a plurality of child pipelineclusters 502 a-b, which may be used as dedicated workers forstreamlining parallel processing. In some arrangements, an entire dataprocessing pipeline may be passed to a child cluster 502 a for handling,rather than individual processing tasks, enabling each child cluster 502a-b to handle an entire data pipeline in a dedicated fashion to maintainisolated processing of different pipelines using different cluster nodes502 a-b. Pipeline orchestrator 501 may provide a software API forstarting, stopping, submitting, or saving pipelines. When a pipeline isstarted, pipeline orchestrator 501 may send the pipeline information toan available worker node 502 a-b, for example using AKKA™ clustering.For each pipeline initialized by pipeline orchestrator 501, a reportingobject with status information may be maintained. Streaming activitiesmay report the last time an event was processed, and the number ofevents processed. Batch activities may report status messages as theyoccur. Pipeline orchestrator 501 may perform batch caching using, forexample, an IGFS™ caching filesystem. This allows activities 512 a-dwithin a pipeline 502 a-b to pass data contexts to one another, with anynecessary parameter configurations.

A pipeline manager 511 a-b may be spawned for every new runningpipeline, and may be used to send activity, status, lifecycle, and eventcount information to the pipeline orchestrator 501. Within a particularpipeline, a plurality of activity actors 512 a-d may be created by apipeline manager 511 a-b to handle individual tasks, and provide outputto data services 522 a-d. Data models used in a given pipeline may bedetermined by the specific pipeline and activities, as directed by apipeline manager 511 a-b. Each pipeline manager 511 a-b controls anddirects the operation of any activity actors 512 a-d spawned by it. Apipeline process may need to coordinate streaming data between tasks.For this, a pipeline manager 511 a-b may spawn service connectors todynamically create TCP connections between activity instances 512 a-d.Data contexts may be maintained for each individual activity 512 a-d,and may be cached for provision to other activities 512 a-d as needed. Adata context defines how an activity accesses information, and anactivity 512 a-d may process data or simply forward it to a next step.Forwarding data between pipeline steps may route data through astreaming context or batch context.

A client service cluster 530 may operate a plurality of service actors521 a-d to serve the requests of activity actors 512 a-d, ideallymaintaining enough service actors 521 a-d to support each activity perthe service type. These may also be arranged within service clusters 520a-d, in a manner similar to the logical organization of activity actors512 a-d within clusters 502 a-b in a data pipeline. A logging service530 may be used to log and sample DCG requests and messages duringoperation while notification service 540 may be used to receive alertsand other notifications during operation (for example to alert onerrors, which may then be diagnosed by reviewing records from loggingservice 530), and by being connected externally to messaging system 510,logging and notification services can be added, removed, or modifiedduring operation without impacting DCG 500. A plurality of DCG protocols550 a-b may be used to provide structured messaging between a DCG 500and messaging system 510, or to enable messaging system 510 todistribute DCG messages across service clusters 520 a-d as shown. Aservice protocol 560 may be used to define service interactions so thata DCG 500 may be modified without impacting service implementations. Inthis manner it can be appreciated that the overall structure of a systemusing an actor-driven DCG 500 operates in a modular fashion, enablingmodification and substitution of various components without impactingother operations or requiring additional reconfiguration.

FIG. 6 is a diagram of an exemplary architecture for a system for rapidpredictive analysis of very large data sets using an actor-drivendistributed computational graph 500, according to one aspect. Accordingto the aspect, a variant messaging arrangement may utilize messagingsystem 510 as a messaging broker using a streaming protocol 610,transmitting and receiving messages immediately using messaging system510 as a message broker to bridge communication between service actors521 a-b as needed. Alternately, individual services 522 a-b maycommunicate directly in a batch context 620, using a data contextservice 630 as a broker to batch-process and relay messages betweenservices 522 a-b.

FIG. 7 is a diagram of an exemplary architecture for a system for rapidpredictive analysis of very large data sets using an actor-drivendistributed computational graph 500, according to one aspect. Accordingto the aspect, a variant messaging arrangement may utilize a serviceconnector 710 as a central message broker between a plurality of serviceactors 521 a-b, bridging messages in a streaming context 610 while adata context service 630 continues to provide direct peer-to-peermessaging between individual services 522 a-b in a batch context 620.

It should be appreciated that various combinations and arrangements ofthe system variants described above (referring to FIGS. 1-7) may bepossible, for example using one particular messaging arrangement for onedata pipeline directed by a pipeline manager 511 a-b, while anotherpipeline may utilize a different messaging arrangement (or may notutilize messaging at all). In this manner, a single DCG 500 and pipelineorchestrator 501 may operate individual pipelines in the manner that ismost suited to their particular needs, with dynamic arrangements beingmade possible through design modularity as described above in FIG. 5.

FIG. 19 is block diagram showing an exemplary system architecture 1900for a system for cybersecurity profiling and rating. The system in thisexample contains a cyber-physical graph 1902 which is used to representa complete picture of an organization's infrastructure and operationsincluding, importantly, the organization's computer networkinfrastructure particularly around system configurations that influencecybersecurity protections and resiliency. The system further contains adirected computational graph 1911, which contains representations ofcomplex processing pipelines and is used to control workflows throughthe system such as determining which 3^(rd) party search tools 1915 touse, assigning search tasks, and analyzing the cyber-physical graph 1902and comparing results of the analysis against reconnaissance datareceived from the reconnaissance engine 1906 and stored in thereconnaissance data storage 1905. In some embodiments, the determinationof which 3^(rd) party search tools 1915 to use and assignment of searchtasks may be implemented by a reconnaissance engine 1906. Thecyber-physical graph 1902 plus the analyses of data directed by thedirected computational graph on the reconnaissance data received fromthe reconnaissance engine 1906 are combined to represent thecyber-security profile of the client organization whose network 1907 isbeing evaluated. A queuing system 1912 is used to organize and schedulethe search tasks requested by the reconnaissance engine 1906. A data torule mapper 1904 is used to retrieve laws, policies, and other rulesfrom an authority database 1903 and compare reconnaissance data receivedfrom the reconnaissance engine 1906 and stored in the reconnaissancedata storage 1905 against the rules in order to determine whether and towhat extent the data received indicates a violation of the rules.Machine learning models 1901 may be used to identify patterns and trendsin any aspect of the system, but in this case are being used to identifypatterns and trends in the data which would help the data to rule mapper1904 determine whether and to what extent certain data indicate aviolation of certain rules. A scoring engine 1910 receives the dataanalyses performed by the directed computational graph 1911, the outputof the data to rule mapper 1904, plus event and loss data 1914 andcontextual data 1909 which defines a context in which the other data areto be scored and/or rated. A public-facing proxy network 1908 isestablished outside of a firewall 1917 around the client network 1907both to control access to the client network from the Internet 1913, andto provide the ability to change the outward presentation of the clientnetwork 1907 to the Internet 1913, which may affect the data obtained bythe reconnaissance engine 1906. In some embodiments, certain componentsof the system may operate outside the client network 1907 and may accessthe client network through a secure, encrypted virtual private network(VPN) 1916, as in a cloud-based or platform-as-a-service implementation,but in other embodiments some or all of these components may beinstalled and operated from within the client network 1907.

As a brief overview of operation, information is obtained about theclient network 1907 and the client organization's operations, which isused to construct a cyber-physical graph 1902 representing therelationships between devices, users, resources, and processes in theorganization, and contextualizing cybersecurity information withphysical and logical relationships that represent the flow of data andaccess to data within the organization including, in particular, networksecurity protocols and procedures. The directed computational graph 1911containing workflows and analysis processes, selects one or moreanalyses to be performed on the cyber-physical graph 1902. Some analysesmay be performed on the information contained in the cyber-physicalgraph, and some analyses may be performed on or against thecyber-physical graph using information obtained from the Internet 1913from reconnaissance engine 1906. The workflows contained in the directedcomputational graph 1911 select one or more search tools to obtaininformation about the organization from the Internet 1915, and maycomprise one or more third party search tools 1915 available on theInternet. As data are collected, they are fed into a reconnaissance datastorage 1905, from which they may be retrieved and further analyzed.Comparisons are made between the data obtained from the reconnaissanceengine 1906, the cyber-physical graph 1902, the data to rule mapper,from which comparisons a cybersecurity profile of the organization isdeveloped. The cybersecurity profile is sent to the scoring engine 1910along with event and loss data 1914 and context data 1909 for thescoring engine 1910 to develop a score and/or rating for theorganization that takes into consideration both the cybersecurityprofile, context, and other information.

FIG. 24 is block diagram showing an exemplary architecture 2400 for ascoring engine. Data fed into the scoring engine comprise thecybersecurity profile 1918 and reconnaissance data 1905 developed atearlier stages of system operation. Based on these data, a frequency andseverity of attack is estimated 2408. For each risk type, curve fitting2402 may be performed on the data points to assign a “best fit” functionalong the range of data points, which captures trends in the data andallows for predictions of how similar data will behave in the future.Aggregations of operational variables 2403 may be applied to identifymaxima, minima, counts, sums, and standard deviations of the data. Riskidentification and quantification is then performed 2413, and a businessimpact analysis is performed 2412 based on a totality of the predictedrisks, their severity, business dependencies reflected in thecyber-physical graph, and prior event and loss data 2410, among othervariables. From this analysis of business impact 2412, a networkresilience rating is assigned 2405, representing a weighted and adjustedtotal of relative exposure the organization has to various types ofrisks, each of which may be assigned a sub-rating. The networkresilience rating 2405 may be a single score for all factors, acombination of scores, or a score for a particular risk or area ofconcern. The network resilience rating 2411 may then be adjusted orfiltered depending on the context in which it is to be used 2409. Forexample, context data received 2408 may indicate that the scores are tobe used for compliance with internal theft policies, but the factorsassociated with the network resilience rating indicate that the highestrisks are associated with cyber-attacks from external systems, which maycause the adjustment for goal/purpose 2409 to filter out the factors ofthe network resilience rating associated with risks from externalcyber-attacks or reduce their contribution to a functional score.Finally, a functional cybersecurity score 2411 is assigned which takesinto account the adjusted factors of the network resilience score andthe context in which the functional score is to be applied. The processmay be iterative, in that the network resilience rating 2405 fromprevious analyses may be fed back into the start of the process atestimation of frequency and severity of attacks 2401.

Detailed Description of Exemplary Aspects

FIG. 29 is a flow diagram illustrating an exemplary method foridentifying an anomalous event. In an initial step 2910, active andpassive reconnaissance results may be received at a scoring engine 2400.This data may then be analyzed 2920 along with a cyber-physical graph todetermine patterns of normal event behavior for various nodes within theCPG, based on observed events over time. Event logs, reconnaissancedata, and other time-series data may then be monitored 2930 to trackevent patterns over time, comparing against normal patterns to identifyanomalies as well as enabling refinement of the normal pattern recordsby incorporating additional data as it is produced. When an event occursthat is recognized to be outside the normal patterns, for example if theevent exceeds a configured threshold for aberrance or involves aknown-compromised node or external address or resource (such as adeliberate “honeypot” node for intrusion detection), it may then beidentified as an anomaly 2940 that may indicate a compromised node or anintrusion attempt. These anomalous events may be used to identifycorrelations in network behavior and identify attack patterns, asdescribed below in FIGS. 30-32.

FIG. 30 is a flow diagram illustrating an exemplary method foridentifying correlations between an anomaly and other network events andresources. According to this method, when an anomaly is identified 3010(as described above, with reference to FIG. 29), it may be correlatedwith other events, network resources, behavior patterns, or any otheravailable information that may be contextually linked to the anomaly.Using a CPG for the network, correlations may be identified by firstcomparing resources involved in the anomaly 3020, for example anymachines that participated in the anomalous event or any databases orother resources that were accessed. This information may then be used tofurther correlate with other events involving those resources 3030, suchas events taking place at the same (or nearly the same) time, or eventswith a recognizable causative relationship such as non-anomalous eventsthat may have been triggered by the anomaly (for example, as would occurif an attacker accessed a resource and used it to perform routinefunctions that are not anomalous in themselves, but were clearly relatedto the anomalous event as they occurred immediately following it duringa time when they would normally be unlikely to happen). An establishednormal behavior pattern (as described above, with reference to FIG. 29)may also be used to identify additional anomalies 3040 that may notcomprise anomalous events (that is, discrete network events that do notcorrespond to established normal event behavior) but rather deviationsfrom normal behavior that occur around the same time or involving thesame resources as an anomalous event. For example, if an anomalous eventoccurs involving a particular computer on the network, behavior logs maybe reviewed 3050 to identify any recent anomalous behavior that may havegone unnoticed, and current behavior 3060 may be checked for anydeviations from established normal patterns. These deviations may bedetermined using preconfigured thresholds, or ad-hoc thresholds that maybe established on the fly based on the anomalous event and otheravailable information pertaining to the incident as it unfolds. Forexample, an event involving a large number of resources or particularlysensitive data stores may cause a threshold for behavior deviation to beset lower than a comparatively minor anomaly involving only a smallnumber of nonessential network resources. In this manner, anomalousevents may be rapidly correlated with any unusual behavior or activityon the network in order to gain a more-complete picture of the extent ofany potential attack and reveal additional information that may be usedin mitigating the attack, as described below in FIGS. 31-32.

FIG. 31 is a flow diagram illustrating an exemplary method forgenerating a behavior graph based on an identified anomaly and itscorrelations. When an anomaly is detected and correlated 3110 asdescribed above (with reference to FIGS. 29-30), a DCG may be used toformulate a behavior graph representing the various behavioralconnections and interactions between involved resources or processespertaining to the anomaly, in order to identify possible event flowsbetween affected nodes and gain further insight into the anomaly and anypossible effects or outcomes it may produce. Initially 3120, the DCG maybe used to identify all behavior interactions between affected processesand resources, using established known behavior patterns and eventcorrelations to iterate over the affected nodes in a CPG until allrelationships have been identified. These behavioral relationships maythen be used 3130 to produce an initial behavioral graph that describesthe interconnectedness between nodes and the various event pathways thatcan occur, including potential (or actual) attach paths that an intrudermay take advantage of when attempting to compromise the network or anyparticular nodes. These pathways indicate what dependencies must besatisfied for any given event or node behavior, what the effects of theevent or behavior are, what nodes are in turn affected by thoseoutcomes, and other such directed flow information. The graph may thenbe used to identify 3140 any possible event flows and interactionsbetween the affected nodes, indicating causative effect pathways thatare triggered by events and node behaviors, which in the case of ananomaly allows insight into what effects the anomaly may have or whatmay have led up to the event in question as is described below, in FIG.32.

FIG. 32 is a flow diagram illustrating an exemplary method fordetermining an attack's point of origin using a behavior graph. When abehavior graph is produced for an identified event anomaly 3210, it maybe used to determine event dependencies 3220 based on the identifiedbehavioral patterns and causative relationships in the graph. Usingthese dependencies, a dependency tree may be produced that comprises thechain of causative events, behaviors, and conditions that led up to theanomaly. This dependency tree comprises the potential event flows andinteraction pathways within and between the nodes, and causativerelationships can be followed through time as branching paths throughthe tree. By traversing this dependency tree backward 3230 (that is,following the path of event flows back in time), it then becomespossible to determine a point of origin for the anomaly and the startingconditions that were in place 3240. This enables more effectivemitigation of attacks and resolution of flaws in a network, byidentifying the precise causes of vulnerabilities and deficiencies sothey may be addressed directly rather than traditional approaches thatare inherently limited to mitigating the outcomes of an unknown attack;in other words, traditional approaches focus on current symptoms of anattack whereas this method is able to directly identify and address theroot cause of the issue.

FIG. 8 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method 800 for cybersecuritybehavioral analytics, according to one aspect. According to the aspect,behavior analytics may utilize passive information feeds from aplurality of existing endpoints (for example, including but not limitedto user activity on a network, network performance, or device behavior)to generate security solutions. In an initial step 801, a web crawler115 may passively collect activity information, which may then beprocessed 802 using a DCG 155 to analyze behavior patterns. Based onthis initial analysis, anomalous behavior may be recognized 803 (forexample, based on a threshold of variance from an established pattern ortrend) such as high-risk users or malicious software operators such asbots. These anomalous behaviors may then be used 804 to analyzepotential angles of attack and then produce 805 security suggestionsbased on this second-level analysis and predictions generated by anaction outcome simulation module 125 to determine the likely effects ofthe change. The suggested behaviors may then be automaticallyimplemented 806 as needed. Passive monitoring 801 then continues,collecting information after new security solutions are implemented 806,enabling machine learning to improve operation over time as therelationship between security changes and observed behaviors and threatsare observed and analyzed.

This method 800 for behavioral analytics enables proactive andhigh-speed reactive defense capabilities against a variety ofcyberattack threats, including anomalous human behaviors as well asnonhuman “bad actors” such as automated software bots that may probefor, and then exploit, existing vulnerabilities. Using automatedbehavioral learning in this manner provides a much more responsivesolution than manual intervention, enabling rapid response to threats tomitigate any potential impact. Utilizing machine learning behaviorfurther enhances this approach, providing additional proactive behaviorthat is not possible in simple automated approaches that merely react tothreats as they occur.

FIG. 9 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method 900 for measuring theeffects of cybersecurity attacks, according to one aspect. According tothe aspect, impact assessment of an attack may be measured using a DCG155 to analyze a user account and identify its access capabilities 901(for example, what files, directories, devices or domains an account mayhave access to). This may then be used to generate 902 an impactassessment score for the account, representing the potential risk shouldthat account be compromised. In the event of an incident, the impactassessment score for any compromised accounts may be used to produce a“blast radius” calculation 903, identifying exactly what resources areat risk as a result of the intrusion and where security personnel shouldfocus their attention. To provide proactive security recommendationsthrough a simulation module 125, simulated intrusions may be run 904 toidentify potential blast radius calculations for a variety of attacksand to determine 905 high risk accounts or resources so that securitymay be improved in those key areas rather than focusing on reactivesolutions.

FIG. 10 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method 1000 for continuouscybersecurity monitoring and exploration, according to one aspect.According to the aspect, a state observation service 140 may receivedata from a variety of connected systems 1001 such as (for example,including but not limited to) servers, domains, databases, or userdirectories. This information may be received continuously, passivelycollecting events and monitoring activity over time while feeding 1002collected information into a graphing service 145 for use in producingtime-series graphs 1003 of states and changes over time. This collatedtime-series data may then be used to produce a visualization 1004 ofchanges over time, quantifying collected data into a meaningful andunderstandable format. As new events are recorded, such as changing userroles or permissions, modifying servers or data structures, or otherchanges within a security infrastructure, these events are automaticallyincorporated into the time-series data and visualizations are updatedaccordingly, providing live monitoring of a wealth of information in away that highlights meaningful data without losing detail due to thequantity of data points under examination.

FIG. 11 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method 1100 for mapping acyber-physical system graph (CPG), according to one aspect. According tothe aspect, a cyber-physical system graph may comprise a visualizationof hierarchies and relationships between devices and resources in asecurity infrastructure, contextualizing security information withphysical device relationships that are easily understandable forsecurity personnel and users. In an initial step 1101, behavioranalytics information (as described previously, referring to FIG. 8) maybe received at a graphing service 145 for inclusion in a CPG. In a nextstep 1102, impact assessment scores (as described previously, referringto FIG. 9) may be received and incorporated in the CPG information,adding risk assessment context to the behavior information. In a nextstep 1103, time-series information (as described previously, referringto FIG. 10) may be received and incorporated, updating CPG informationas changes occur and events are logged. This information may then beused to produce 1104 a graph visualization of users, servers, devices,and other resources correlating physical relationships (such as a user'spersonal computer or smartphone, or physical connections betweenservers) with logical relationships (such as access privileges ordatabase connections), to produce a meaningful and contextualizedvisualization of a security infrastructure that reflects the currentstate of the internal relationships present in the infrastructure.

FIG. 12 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method 1200 for continuousnetwork resilience rating, according to one aspect. According to theaspect, a baseline score can be used to measure an overall level of riskfor a network infrastructure, and may be compiled by first collecting1201 information on publicly-disclosed vulnerabilities, such as (forexample) using the Internet or common vulnerabilities and exploits (CVE)process. This information may then 1202 be incorporated into a CPG asdescribed previously in FIG. 11, and the combined data of the CPG andthe known vulnerabilities may then be analyzed 1203 to identify therelationships between known vulnerabilities and risks exposed bycomponents of the infrastructure. This produces a combined CPG 1204 thatincorporates both the internal risk level of network resources, useraccounts, and devices as well as the actual risk level based on theanalysis of known vulnerabilities and security risks.

FIG. 13 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method 1300 for cybersecurityprivilege oversight, according to one aspect. According to the aspect,time-series data (as described above, referring to FIG. 10) may becollected 1301 for user accounts, credentials, directories, and otheruser-based privilege and access information. This data may then 1302 beanalyzed to identify changes over time that may affect security, such asmodifying user access privileges or adding new users. The results ofanalysis may be checked 1303 against a CPG (as described previously inFIG. 11), to compare and correlate user directory changes with theactual infrastructure state. This comparison may be used to performaccurate and context-enhanced user directory audits 1304 that identifynot only current user credentials and other user-specific information,but changes to this information over time and how the user informationrelates to the actual infrastructure (for example, credentials thatgrant access to devices and may therefore implicitly grant additionalaccess due to device relationships that were not immediately apparentfrom the user directory alone).

FIG. 14 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method 1400 for cybersecurityrisk management, according to one aspect. According to the aspect,multiple methods described previously may be combined to provide liveassessment of attacks as they occur, by first receiving 1401 time-seriesdata for an infrastructure (as described previously, in FIG. 10) toprovide live monitoring of network events. This data is then enhanced1402 with a CPG (as described above in FIG. 11) to correlate events withactual infrastructure elements, such as servers or accounts. When anevent (for example, an attempted attack against a vulnerable system orresource) occurs 1403, the event is logged in the time-series data 1404,and compared against the CPG 1405 to determine the impact. This isenhanced with the inclusion of impact assessment information 1406 forany affected resources, and the attack is then checked against abaseline score 1407 to determine the full extent of the impact of theattack and any necessary modifications to the infrastructure orpolicies.

FIG. 15 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method 1500 for mitigatingcompromised credential threats, according to one aspect. According tothe aspect, impact assessment scores (as described previously, referringto FIG. 9) may be collected 1501 for user accounts in a directory, sothat the potential impact of any given credential attack is known inadvance of an actual attack event. This information may be combined witha CPG 1502 as described previously in FIG. 11, to contextualize impactassessment scores within the infrastructure (for example, so that it maybe predicted what systems or resources might be at risk for any givencredential attack). A simulated attack may then be performed 1503 to usemachine learning to improve security without waiting for actual attacksto trigger a reactive response. A blast radius assessment (as describedabove in FIG. 9) may be used in response 1504 to determine the effectsof the simulated attack and identify points of weakness, and produce arecommendation report 1505 for improving and hardening theinfrastructure against future attacks.

FIG. 16 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method 1600 for dynamicnetwork and rogue device discovery, according to one aspect. Accordingto the aspect, an advanced cyber decision platform may continuouslymonitor a network in real-time 1601, detecting any changes as theyoccur. When a new connection is detected 1602, a CPG may be updated 1603with the new connection information, which may then be compared againstthe network's resiliency score 1604 to examine for potential risk. Theblast radius metric for any other devices involved in the connection mayalso be checked 1605, to examine the context of the connection for riskpotential (for example, an unknown connection to an internal data serverwith sensitive information may be considered a much higher risk than anunknown connection to an externally-facing web server). If theconnection is a risk, an alert may be sent to an administrator 1606 withthe contextual information for the connection to provide a concisenotification of relevant details for quick handling.

FIG. 17 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method 1700 for Kerberos“golden ticket” attack detection, according to one aspect. Kerberos is anetwork authentication protocol employed across many enterprise networksto enable single sign-on and authentication for enterprise services.This makes it an attractive target for attacks, which can result inpersistent, undetected access to services within a network in what isknown as a “golden ticket” attack. To detect this form of attack,behavioral analytics may be employed to detect forged authenticationtickets resulting from an attack. According to the aspect, an advancedcyber decision platform may continuously monitor a network 1701,informing a CPG in real-time of all traffic associated with entities inan organization, for example, people, places, devices, or services 1702.Machine learning algorithms detect behavioral anomalies as they occur inreal-time 1703, notifying administrators with an assessment of theanomalous event 1704 as well as a blast radius score for the particularevent and a network resiliency score to advise of the overall health ofthe network. By automatically detecting unusual behavior and informingan administrator of the anomaly along with contextual information forthe event and network, a compromised ticket is immediately detected whena new authentication connection is made.

FIG. 18 is a flow diagram of an exemplary method 1800 for risk-basedvulnerability and patch management, according to one aspect. Accordingto the aspect, an advanced cyber decision platform may monitor allinformation about a network 1801, including (but not limited to) devicetelemetry data, log files, connections and network events, deployedsoftware versions, or contextual user activity information. Thisinformation is incorporated into a CPG 1802 to maintain an up-to-datemodel of the network in real-time. When a new vulnerability isdiscovered, a blast radius score may be assessed 1803 and the network'sresiliency score may be updated 1804 as needed. A security alert maythen be produced 1805 to notify an administrator of the vulnerabilityand its impact, and a proposed patch may be presented 1806 along withthe predicted effects of the patch on the vulnerability's blast radiusand the overall network resiliency score. This determines both the totalimpact risk of any particular vulnerability, as well as the overalleffect of each vulnerability on the network as a whole. This continuousnetwork assessment may be used to collect information about newvulnerabilities and exploits to provide proactive solutions with clearresult predictions, before attacks occur.

FIG. 20 is a relational diagram showing the relationships betweenexemplary 3^(rd) party search tools 1915, search tasks 2010 that can begenerated using such tools, and the types of information that may begathered with those tasks 2011-2014, and how a public-facing proxynetwork 1908 may be used to influence the search task results. While theuse of 3^(rd) party search tools 1915 is in no way required, andproprietary or other self-developed search tools may be used, there arenumerous 3^(rd) party search tools 1915 available on the Internet, manyof them available for use free of charge, that are convenient forpurposes of performing external and internal reconnaissance of anorganization's infrastructure. Because they are well-known, they areincluded here as examples of the types of search tools that may be usedand the reconnaissance data that may be gathered using such tools. Thesearch tasks 2010 that may be generated may be classified into severalcategories. While this category list is by no means exhaustive, severalimportant categories of reconnaissance data are domain and internetprotocol (IP) address searching tasks 2011, corporate informationsearching tasks 2012, data breach searching tasks 2013, and dark websearching tasks 2014. Third party search tools 1915 for domain and IPaddress searching tasks 2011 include, for example, DNSDumpster,Spiderfoot HX, Shodan, VirusTotal, Dig, Censys, ViewDNS, and CheckDMARC,among others. These tools may be used to obtain reconnaissance dataabout an organization's server IPs, software, geolocation; open ports,patch/setting vulnerabilities; data hosting services, among other data2031. Third party search tools 1915 for corporate information searchingtasks 2012 include, for example, Bloomberg.com, Wikipedia, SEC.gov,AnnualReports.com, DNB.com, Hunter.io, and MarketVisual, among others.These tools may be used to obtain reconnaissance data about anorganization's addresses; corp info; high value target (key employee orkey data assets) lists, emails, phone numbers, online presence 2032.Third party search tools 1915 for data breach searching tasks 2013include, for example, DeHashed, WeLeakInfo, Pastebin, Spiderfoot, andBreachCompilation, among others. These tools may be used to obtainreconnaissance data about an organization's previous data breaches,especially those involving high value targets, and similar data lossinformation 2033. Third party search tools 1915 for deep web (reports,records, and other documents linked to in web pages, but not indexed insearch results . . . estimated to be 90% of available web content) anddark web (websites accessible only through anonymizers such as TOR . . .estimated to be about 6% of available web content) searching tasks 2014include, for example, Pipl, MyLife, Yippy, SurfWax, Wayback machine,Google Scholar, DuckDuckGo, Fazzle, Not Evil, and Start Page, amongothers. These tools may be used to obtain reconnaissance data about anorganization's lost and stolen data such as customer credit cardnumbers, stolen subscription credentials, hacked accounts, softwaretools designed for certain exploits, which organizations are beingtargeted for certain attacks, and similar information 2034. Apublic-facing proxy network 1908 may be used to change the outwardpresentation of the organization's network by conducting the searchesthrough selectable attribution nodes 2021 a-n, which are configurable topresent the network to the Internet in different ways such as, but notlimited to, presenting the organization network as a commercial IPaddress, a residential IP address, or as an IP address from a particularcountry, all of which may influence the reconnaissance data receivedusing certain search tools.

FIG. 21 is a relational diagram showing the exemplary types andclassifications of information that may be used in constructing acyber-physical graph 1902 of an organization's infrastructure andoperations. The cyber-physical graph 1902 is a directed graph thatrepresents a comprehensive picture of an organization's infrastructureand operations. A cyber-physical graph 1902 represents the relationshipsbetween entities associated with an organization, for example, devices,users, resources, groups, and computing services, the relationshipsbetween the entities defining relationships and processes in anorganization's infrastructure, thereby contextualizing securityinformation with physical and logical relationships that represent theflow of data and access to data within the organization including, inparticular, network security protocols and procedures. Data that may beincorporated into a cyber-physical graph may be any data relating to anorganization's infrastructure and operations, and two primary categoriesof data that may be incorporated are internal reconnaissance data 2110and external reconnaissance data 2120. Non-limiting examples of internalreconnaissance data 2110 include computers and devices, physical andintangible (data) assets, people (employees, contractors, etc.),addresses and locations of buildings, servers, etc., business processes,access privileges, loss information, legal documents, andself-assessments of cybersecurity. Non-limiting examples of externalreconnaissance data 2120 include domains and IP information, data breachinformation, organization information such as corporate structures, keyemployees, etc., open port information, information regarding whichorganizations are current targets of cyber-attacks, networkvulnerability information, system version and patch/update information,known and possible exploits, and publicly available information.

In an initial step 1101, behavior analytics information (as describedpreviously, referring to FIG. 8) may be received at a graphing service145 for inclusion in a CPG. In a next step 1102, impact assessmentscores (as described previously, referring to FIG. 9) may be receivedand incorporated in the CPG information, adding risk assessment contextto the behavior information. In a next step 1103, time-seriesinformation (as described previously, referring to FIG. 10) may bereceived and incorporated, updating CPG information as changes occur andevents are logged. This information may then be used to produce 1104 agraph visualization of users, servers, devices, and other resourcescorrelating physical relationships (such as a user's personal computeror smartphone, or physical connections between servers) with logicalrelationships (such as access privileges or database connections), toproduce a meaningful and contextualized visualization of a securityinfrastructure that reflects the current state of the internalrelationships present in the infrastructure.

FIG. 22 is a directed graph diagram showing an exemplary cyber-physicalgraph 2200 and its possible use in creating cybersecurity profiles andratings. A cyber-physical graph 1902 represents the relationshipsbetween entities associated with an organization, for example, devices,users, resources, groups, and computing services, the relationshipsbetween the entities defining relationships and processes in anorganization's infrastructure, thereby contextualizing securityinformation with physical and logical relationships that represent theflow of data and access to data within the organization including, inparticular, network security protocols and procedures. A cyber-physicalgraph, in its most basic form, represents the network devices comprisingan organization's network infrastructure as nodes (also called vertices)in the graph and the physical or logical connections between them asedges between the nodes. The cyber-physical graph may be expanded toinclude network information and processes such as data flow, securityprotocols and procedures, and software versions and patch information.Further, human users and their access privileges to devices and assetsmay be included. A cyber-security graph may be further expanded toinclude internal process information such as business processes, lossinformation, and legal requirements and documents; external informationsuch as domain and IP information, data breach information; andgenerated information such as open port information from externalnetwork scans, and vulnerabilities and avenues of attack. Thus, acyber-physical graph may be used to represent a complete picture of anorganization's infrastructure and operations.

In this example, which is necessarily simplified for clarity, thecyber-physical graph 2200 contains 12 nodes (vertices) comprising: sevencomputers and devices designated by solid circles 2202, 2203, 2204,2206, 2207, 2209, 2210, two users designated by dashed-line circles2201, 2211, and three functional groups designated by dotted-linecircles 2205, 2208, and 2212. The edges (lines) between the nodesindicate relationships between the nodes, and have a direction andrelationship indicator such as “AdminTo,” “MemberOf,” etc. While notshown here, the edges may also be assigned numerical weights orprobabilities, indicating, for example, the likelihood of a successfulattack gaining access from one node to another. Possible attack pathsmay be analyzed using the cyber-physical graph by running graph analysisalgorithms such as shortest path algorithms, minimum cost/maximum flowalgorithms, strongly connected node algorithms, etc. In this example,several exemplary attack paths are ranked by likelihood. In the mostlikely attack path, user 2201 is an administrator to device 2202 towhich device 2203 has connected. Device 2203 is a member of functionalgroup 2208, which has a member of group 2212. Functional group 2212 isan administrator to the target 2206. In a second most likely attackpath, user 2201 is an administrator to device 2207 to which device 2204has connected. Device 2204 is a member of functional group 2205, whichis an administrator to the target device 2206. In a third most likelyattack path, a flaw in the security protocols allow the credentials ofuser 2201 to be used to gain access to device 2210. User 2211 who isworking on device 2210 may be tricked into providing access tofunctional group 2205, which is an administrator to the target device2206.

FIG. 23 is a block diagram showing exemplary operation of a data to rulemapper. Laws, policies, standards, and other rules are gathered andstored in an authority database 1903. Non-limiting examples of suchrules include federal, state, and local statutes, regulations, case lawinterpretations, and other laws 2310, business policies and procedures2320, and industry standards (as one example, cybersecurity industrystandards for network security) 2330. Reconnaissance data are stored ina database 1905. A data to rule mapper 1904 retrieves the reconnaissancedata 1905 and matches it to rules from the authority database 1903. Anexample of this operation for statues/regulations 2310 is shown in 2311,where Article 33, paragraph 1 of the European Union's General DataProtection Regulation (GDPR) requires that an organization notify acognizant authority of a data breach within 72 hours of knowledge of thebreach. If a data point indicates that a data breach has been discoveredbecause data of the organization is found online, the data point isassociated with that rule, and tagged with the possible impact of finesif the rule is not followed. An example of this operation for businesspolicies 2320 is shown in 2321, where a corporate policy prohibitsaccess of the organization's systems using personal computers. If a datapoint indicates that an employee account is accessed using anon-business-owned computer, the data point is associated with the rule,and tagged with possible data theft and/or security breach. An exampleof this operation for industry standards 2330 is shown in 2331, where anindustry standard prohibits open ports accessible from outside thenetwork perimeter. If a data point indicates an open port, the datapoint is associated with the rule, and tagged with possible data lossand/or security breach.

Hardware Architecture

Generally, the techniques disclosed herein may be implemented onhardware or a combination of software and hardware. For example, theymay be implemented in an operating system kernel, in a separate userprocess, in a library package bound into network applications, on aspecially constructed machine, on an application-specific integratedcircuit (ASIC), or on a network interface card.

Software/hardware hybrid implementations of at least some of the aspectsdisclosed herein may be implemented on a programmable network-residentmachine (which should be understood to include intermittently connectednetwork-aware machines) selectively activated or reconfigured by acomputer program stored in memory. Such network devices may havemultiple network interfaces that may be configured or designed toutilize different types of network communication protocols. A generalarchitecture for some of these machines may be described herein in orderto illustrate one or more exemplary means by which a given unit offunctionality may be implemented. According to specific aspects, atleast some of the features or functionalities of the various aspectsdisclosed herein may be implemented on one or more general-purposecomputers associated with one or more networks, such as for example anend-user computer system, a client computer, a network server or otherserver system, a mobile computing device (e.g., tablet computing device,mobile phone, smartphone, laptop, or other appropriate computingdevice), a consumer electronic device, a music player, or any othersuitable electronic device, router, switch, or other suitable device, orany combination thereof. In at least some aspects, at least some of thefeatures or functionalities of the various aspects disclosed herein maybe implemented in one or more virtualized computing environments (e.g.,network computing clouds, virtual machines hosted on one or morephysical computing machines, or other appropriate virtual environments).

Referring now to FIG. 25, there is shown a block diagram depicting anexemplary computing device 10 suitable for implementing at least aportion of the features or functionalities disclosed herein. Computingdevice 10 may be, for example, any one of the computing machines listedin the previous paragraph, or indeed any other electronic device capableof executing software- or hardware-based instructions according to oneor more programs stored in memory. Computing device 10 may be configuredto communicate with a plurality of other computing devices, such asclients or servers, over communications networks such as a wide areanetwork a metropolitan area network, a local area network, a wirelessnetwork, the Internet, or any other network, using known protocols forsuch communication, whether wireless or wired.

In one aspect, computing device 10 includes one or more centralprocessing units (CPU) 12, one or more interfaces 15, and one or morebusses 14 (such as a peripheral component interconnect (PCI) bus). Whenacting under the control of appropriate software or firmware, CPU 12 maybe responsible for implementing specific functions associated with thefunctions of a specifically configured computing device or machine. Forexample, in at least one aspect, a computing device 10 may be configuredor designed to function as a server system utilizing CPU 12, localmemory 11 and/or remote memory 16, and interface(s) 15. In at least oneaspect, CPU 12 may be caused to perform one or more of the differenttypes of functions and/or operations under the control of softwaremodules or components, which for example, may include an operatingsystem and any appropriate applications software, drivers, and the like.

CPU 12 may include one or more processors 13 such as, for example, aprocessor from one of the Intel, ARM, Qualcomm, and AMD families ofmicroprocessors. In some aspects, processors 13 may include speciallydesigned hardware such as application-specific integrated circuits(ASICs), electrically erasable programmable read-only memories(EEPROMs), field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), and so forth, forcontrolling operations of computing device 10. In a particular aspect, alocal memory 11 (such as non-volatile random access memory (RAM) and/orread-only memory (ROM), including for example one or more levels ofcached memory) may also form part of CPU 12. However, there are manydifferent ways in which memory may be coupled to system 10. Memory 11may be used for a variety of purposes such as, for example, cachingand/or storing data, programming instructions, and the like. It shouldbe further appreciated that CPU 12 may be one of a variety ofsystem-on-a-chip (SOC) type hardware that may include additionalhardware such as memory or graphics processing chips, such as a QUALCOMMSNAPDRAGON™ or SAMSUNG EXYNOS™ CPU as are becoming increasingly commonin the art, such as for use in mobile devices or integrated devices.

As used herein, the term “processor” is not limited merely to thoseintegrated circuits referred to in the art as a processor, a mobileprocessor, or a microprocessor, but broadly refers to a microcontroller,a microcomputer, a programmable logic controller, anapplication-specific integrated circuit, and any other programmablecircuit.

In one aspect, interfaces 15 are provided as network interface cards(NICs). Generally, NICs control the sending and receiving of datapackets over a computer network; other types of interfaces 15 may forexample support other peripherals used with computing device 10. Amongthe interfaces that may be provided are Ethernet interfaces, frame relayinterfaces, cable interfaces, DSL interfaces, token ring interfaces,graphics interfaces, and the like. In addition, various types ofinterfaces may be provided such as, for example, universal serial bus(USB), Serial, Ethernet, FIREWIRE™, THUNDERBOLT™, PCI, parallel, radiofrequency (RF), BLUETOOTH™, near-field communications (e.g., usingnear-field magnetics), 802.11 (WiFi), frame relay, TCP/IP, ISDN, fastEthernet interfaces, Gigabit Ethernet interfaces, Serial ATA (SATA) orexternal SATA (ESATA) interfaces, high-definition multimedia interface(HDMI), digital visual interface (DVI), analog or digital audiointerfaces, asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) interfaces, high-speedserial interface (HSSI) interfaces, Point of Sale (POS) interfaces,fiber data distributed interfaces (FDDIs), and the like. Generally, suchinterfaces 15 may include physical ports appropriate for communicationwith appropriate media. In some cases, they may also include anindependent processor (such as a dedicated audio or video processor, asis common in the art for high-fidelity AN hardware interfaces) and, insome instances, volatile and/or non-volatile memory (e.g., RAM).

Although the system shown in FIG. 25 illustrates one specificarchitecture for a computing device 10 for implementing one or more ofthe aspects described herein, it is by no means the only devicearchitecture on which at least a portion of the features and techniquesdescribed herein may be implemented. For example, architectures havingone or any number of processors 13 may be used, and such processors 13may be present in a single device or distributed among any number ofdevices. In one aspect, a single processor 13 handles communications aswell as routing computations, while in other aspects a separatededicated communications processor may be provided. In various aspects,different types of features or functionalities may be implemented in asystem according to the aspect that includes a client device (such as atablet device or smartphone running client software) and server systems(such as a server system described in more detail below).

Regardless of network device configuration, the system of an aspect mayemploy one or more memories or memory modules (such as, for example,remote memory block 16 and local memory 11) configured to store data,program instructions for the general-purpose network operations, orother information relating to the functionality of the aspects describedherein (or any combinations of the above). Program instructions maycontrol execution of or comprise an operating system and/or one or moreapplications, for example. Memory 16 or memories 11, 16 may also beconfigured to store data structures, configuration data, encryptiondata, historical system operations information, or any other specific orgeneric non-program information described herein.

Because such information and program instructions may be employed toimplement one or more systems or methods described herein, at least somenetwork device aspects may include nontransitory machine-readablestorage media, which, for example, may be configured or designed tostore program instructions, state information, and the like forperforming various operations described herein. Examples of suchnontransitory machine-readable storage media include, but are notlimited to, magnetic media such as hard disks, floppy disks, andmagnetic tape; optical media such as CD-ROM disks; magneto-optical mediasuch as optical disks, and hardware devices that are speciallyconfigured to store and perform program instructions, such as read-onlymemory devices (ROM), flash memory (as is common in mobile devices andintegrated systems), solid state drives (SSD) and “hybrid SSD” storagedrives that may combine physical components of solid state and hard diskdrives in a single hardware device (as are becoming increasingly commonin the art with regard to personal computers), memristor memory, randomaccess memory (RAM), and the like. It should be appreciated that suchstorage means may be integral and non-removable (such as RAM hardwaremodules that may be soldered onto a motherboard or otherwise integratedinto an electronic device), or they may be removable such as swappableflash memory modules (such as “thumb drives” or other removable mediadesigned for rapidly exchanging physical storage devices),“hot-swappable” hard disk drives or solid state drives, removableoptical storage discs, or other such removable media, and that suchintegral and removable storage media may be utilized interchangeably.Examples of program instructions include both object code, such as maybe produced by a compiler, machine code, such as may be produced by anassembler or a linker, byte code, such as may be generated by forexample a JAVA™ compiler and may be executed using a Java virtualmachine or equivalent, or files containing higher level code that may beexecuted by the computer using an interpreter (for example, scriptswritten in Python, Perl, Ruby, Groovy, or any other scripting language).

In some aspects, systems may be implemented on a standalone computingsystem. Referring now to FIG. 26, there is shown a block diagramdepicting a typical exemplary architecture of one or more aspects orcomponents thereof on a standalone computing system. Computing device 20includes processors 21 that may run software that carry out one or morefunctions or applications of aspects, such as for example a clientapplication 24. Processors 21 may carry out computing instructions undercontrol of an operating system 22 such as, for example, a version ofMICROSOFT WINDOWS™ operating system, APPLE macOS™ or iOS™ operatingsystems, some variety of the Linux operating system, ANDROID™ operatingsystem, or the like. In many cases, one or more shared services 23 maybe operable in system 20, and may be useful for providing commonservices to client applications 24. Services 23 may for example beWINDOWS™ services, user-space common services in a Linux environment, orany other type of common service architecture used with operating system21. Input devices 28 may be of any type suitable for receiving userinput, including for example a keyboard, touchscreen, microphone (forexample, for voice input), mouse, touchpad, trackball, or anycombination thereof. Output devices 27 may be of any type suitable forproviding output to one or more users, whether remote or local to system20, and may include for example one or more screens for visual output,speakers, printers, or any combination thereof. Memory 25 may berandom-access memory having any structure and architecture known in theart, for use by processors 21, for example to run software. Storagedevices 26 may be any magnetic, optical, mechanical, memristor, orelectrical storage device for storage of data in digital form (such asthose described above, referring to FIG. 25). Examples of storagedevices 26 include flash memory, magnetic hard drive, CD-ROM, and/or thelike.

In some aspects, systems may be implemented on a distributed computingnetwork, such as one having any number of clients and/or servers.Referring now to FIG. 27, there is shown a block diagram depicting anexemplary architecture 30 for implementing at least a portion of asystem according to one aspect on a distributed computing network.According to the aspect, any number of clients 33 may be provided. Eachclient 33 may run software for implementing client-side portions of asystem; clients may comprise a system 20 such as that illustrated inFIG. 26. In addition, any number of servers 32 may be provided forhandling requests received from one or more clients 33. Clients 33 andservers 32 may communicate with one another via one or more electronicnetworks 31, which may be in various aspects any of the Internet, a widearea network, a mobile telephony network (such as CDMA or GSM cellularnetworks), a wireless network (such as WiFi, WiMAX, LTE, and so forth),or a local area network (or indeed any network topology known in theart; the aspect does not prefer any one network topology over anyother). Networks 31 may be implemented using any known networkprotocols, including for example wired and/or wireless protocols.

In addition, in some aspects, servers 32 may call external services 37when needed to obtain additional information, or to refer to additionaldata concerning a particular call. Communications with external services37 may take place, for example, via one or more networks 31. In variousaspects, external services 37 may comprise web-enabled services orfunctionality related to or installed on the hardware device itself. Forexample, in one aspect where client applications 24 are implemented on asmartphone or other electronic device, client applications 24 may obtaininformation stored in a server system 32 in the cloud or on an externalservice 37 deployed on one or more of a particular enterprise's oruser's premises. In addition to local storage on servers 32, remotestorage 38 may be accessible through the network(s) 31.

In some aspects, clients 33 or servers 32 (or both) may make use of oneor more specialized services or appliances that may be deployed locallyor remotely across one or more networks 31. For example, one or moredatabases 34 in either local or remote storage 38 may be used orreferred to by one or more aspects. It should be understood by onehaving ordinary skill in the art that databases in storage 34 may bearranged in a wide variety of architectures and using a wide variety ofdata access and manipulation means. For example, in various aspects oneor more databases in storage 34 may comprise a relational databasesystem using a structured query language (SQL), while others maycomprise an alternative data storage technology such as those referredto in the art as “NoSQL” (for example, HADOOP CASSANDRA™, GOOGLEBIGTABLE™, and so forth). In some aspects, variant databasearchitectures such as column-oriented databases, in-memory databases,clustered databases, distributed databases, or even flat file datarepositories may be used according to the aspect. It will be appreciatedby one having ordinary skill in the art that any combination of known orfuture database technologies may be used as appropriate, unless aspecific database technology or a specific arrangement of components isspecified for a particular aspect described herein. Moreover, it shouldbe appreciated that the term “database” as used herein may refer to aphysical database machine, a cluster of machines acting as a singledatabase system, or a logical database within an overall databasemanagement system. Unless a specific meaning is specified for a givenuse of the term “database”, it should be construed to mean any of thesesenses of the word, all of which are understood as a plain meaning ofthe term “database” by those having ordinary skill in the art.

Similarly, some aspects may make use of one or more security systems 36and configuration systems 35. Security and configuration management arecommon information technology (IT) and web functions, and some amount ofeach are generally associated with any IT or web systems. It should beunderstood by one having ordinary skill in the art that anyconfiguration or security subsystems known in the art now or in thefuture may be used in conjunction with aspects without limitation,unless a specific security 36 or configuration system 35 or approach isspecifically required by the description of any specific aspect.

FIG. 28 shows an exemplary overview of a computer system 40 as may beused in any of the various locations throughout the system. It isexemplary of any computer that may execute code to process data. Variousmodifications and changes may be made to computer system 40 withoutdeparting from the broader scope of the system and method disclosedherein. Central processor unit (CPU) 41 is connected to bus 42, to whichbus is also connected memory 43, nonvolatile memory 44, display 47,input/output (I/O) unit 48, and network interface card (NIC) 53. I/Ounit 48 may, typically, be connected to peripherals such as a keyboard49, pointing device 50, hard disk 52, real-time clock 51, a camera 57,and other peripheral devices. NIC 53 connects to network 54, which maybe the Internet or a local network, which local network may or may nothave connections to the Internet. The system may be connected to othercomputing devices through the network via a router 55, wireless localarea network 56, or any other network connection. Also shown as part ofsystem 40 is power supply unit 45 connected, in this example, to a mainalternating current (AC) supply 46. Not shown are batteries that couldbe present, and many other devices and modifications that are well knownbut are not applicable to the specific novel functions of the currentsystem and method disclosed herein. It should be appreciated that someor all components illustrated may be combined, such as in variousintegrated applications, for example Qualcomm or Samsungsystem-on-a-chip (SOC) devices, or whenever it may be appropriate tocombine multiple capabilities or functions into a single hardware device(for instance, in mobile devices such as smartphones, video gameconsoles, in-vehicle computer systems such as navigation or multimediasystems in automobiles, or other integrated hardware devices).

In various aspects, functionality for implementing systems or methods ofvarious aspects may be distributed among any number of client and/orserver components. For example, various software modules may beimplemented for performing various functions in connection with thesystem of any particular aspect, and such modules may be variouslyimplemented to run on server and/or client components.

The skilled person will be aware of a range of possible modifications ofthe various aspects described above. Accordingly, the present inventionis defined by the claims and their equivalents.

What is claimed is:
 1. A system for correlating network event anomaliesto identify attack information, comprising: a cyber-physical graphmodule comprising a first plurality of programming instructions storedin a memory of, and operating on a processor of, a computing device,wherein the first plurality of programming instructions, when operatingon the processor, cause the computing device to create a cyber-physicalgraph of the organization using the information, the cyber-physicalgraph comprising nodes representing entities associated with theorganization and edges representing relationships between entitiesassociated with the organization; a reconnaissance engine comprising asecond plurality of programming instructions stored in the memory of,and operating on the processor of, the computing device, wherein thesecond plurality of programming instructions, when operating on theprocessor, cause the computing device to: perform a reconnaissancesearch using the cyber-physical graph; and apply some or all of theresults of the reconnaissance search to the cyber-physical graph tocreate a normal behavior model for a plurality of nodes in thecyber-physical graph; and a directed computational graph enginecomprising a third plurality of programming instructions stored in thememory of, and operating on the processor of, the computing device,wherein the third plurality of programming instructions, when operatingon the processor, cause the computing device to: receive thecybersecurity profile and the normal behavior model; using thecyber-physical graph and the normal behavior model: identify ananomalous event based on analysis of cyber-physical graph and the normalbehavior model; analyze the cyber-physical graph and the normal behaviormodel to identify correlations between affected nodes, the affectednodes being based on the anomalous event; generate a behavior graphbased on the identified correlations; analyze the behavior graph toproduce a dependency tree comprising causative relationships betweenevents; and traverse the behavior tree backward in a temporal dimensionto identify a plurality of starting conditions for the anomalous event.2. The system of claim 1, wherein the starting conditions comprise anode identified as the point-of-origin for the anomalous event.
 3. Thesystem of claim 1, wherein the information about the organizationfurther comprises information about business processes within theorganization.
 4. The system of claim 1, wherein the information aboutthe organization further comprises prior loss information for theorganization.
 5. A method for correlating network event anomalies toidentify attack information, comprising the steps of: creating acyber-physical graph of an organization using entities associated withthe organization and relationships between the entities associated withthe organization, the cyber-physical graph comprising nodes representingthe entities associated with the organization and edges representing therelationships between entities associated with the organization;performing a reconnaissance search using the cyber-physical graph;applying some or all of the results of the reconnaissance search to thecyber-physical graph to create a normal behavior model for a pluralityof nodes in the cyber-physical graph; and using the cyber-physical graphand the normal behavior model: identifying an anomalous event based onanalysis of cyber-physical graph and the normal behavior model;analyzing the cyber-physical graph and the normal behavior model toidentify correlations between affected nodes, the affected nodes beingbased on the anomalous event; generating a behavior graph based on theidentified correlations; analyzing the behavior graph to produce adependency tree comprising causative relationships between events; andtraversing the behavior tree backward in a temporal dimension toidentify a plurality of starting conditions for the anomalous event. 6.The method of claim 5, wherein the starting conditions comprise a nodeidentified as the point-of-origin for the anomalous event.
 7. The methodof claim 5 wherein the information about the organization furthercomprises information about business processes within the organization.8. The method of claim 5 wherein the information about the organizationfurther comprises prior loss information for the organization.